Page 132 of Sweet Dominion

Inside, the trunk was lined with dark velvet and nestled within were tons of wooden objects—daggers, to be precise. They looked ancient, worn with time, each one carved and shaped oddly. Some had smudges of dirt or clumps of grassy mud all over them.

What the hell?

“These,” Lei went over and carefully lifted one of the daggers out of the trunk, “are the daggers the Crownsville Bandit would ask me to dig up every time she came to me. And you can see she came up to me a lot.”

TT’s breath caught in her throat and she reached out a trembling hand to touch the dagger. “She?”

“Oh yeah.” Lei handed the dagger to her. “The Crownsville Bandit is a woman.”

A strained sound left Rose.

I checked her and she tried to get Dima’s notebook, but he was already writing stuff down.

TT didn’t take the dagger.

Instead, she just stared at it, almost. . .frozen in pure, unadulterated shock.

Lei held onto the dagger. “I never understood why the ghost wanted me to get them. Long ago I did wonder and obsess about it. . .but. . .my theories never went anywhere and so I would just grab them so she would leave me alone, which she would once I dug one out. As soon as she saw it in my hand, she just. . .”

I leaned forward.

“Her and her men would just disappear.”

I looked back at TT.

She was still frozen with her mouth open and her gaze stuck to the dagger.

I swallowed. “TT, are you okay?”

TT’s bottom lip quivered and she lifted her view to Lei. “She?”

I tried not to laugh.

Lei bobbed his head. “Yes. The Bandit is a woman.”

TT’s breaths picked up at an uneasy pace. “B-black?”

“Yes. Tall and black. Not much muscle, but she had these ghostly guns in her side holsters that told me she knew how to handle guns.”

TT’s eyes widened even further and I saw her chest start to rise and fall rapidly, her excitement teetering on the edge of something more intense.

Oh wait. . .is she going to be, okay?

TT began muttering to herself and staring at the daggers. “In the Bandit’s Gospel, it starts off, ‘To my children.’ I thought that was a weird way for amalerebel leader to look at his men, but. . .”

TT’s breath quickened and I saw the familiar signs—her hands starting to shake, her brown face going to a paler color.

Shit.

I gestured to Jo.

“She saw herself as a mother to them. P-protecting them.” TT began to hyperventilate.

“Damn it.” Jo dug into her pants pocket and fished out TT’s inhaler.

The veins in TT’s small neck pulsed with her panicked breaths.

I grabbed it and rushed to TT’s side, trying to get her to focus on me and on her breathing. “Calm down.”

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